


that will be enough

by merriell



Series: antarlina (e) [8]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Demon Babysitting, Discussions of magic, M/M, Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-02
Updated: 2019-09-03
Packaged: 2020-07-29 08:31:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20079229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merriell/pseuds/merriell
Summary: 2022. Kanggani stayed over at Kinan's for a weekend, and planted the kind of questions in Kinan that makes him wonder about his relationship with Reno.





	1. Chapter 1

Kinan had done plenty of things throughout his life. He had won a basketball championship with mostly shitty players, had managed to juggled sport, academics and organisational skills by sheer hard work alone, had won seats in the regional assembly, had even go through a month in the wilderness, volunteering, without even the slightest hint of press only for the pictures to be leaked by another volunteer without his consent. Granted the last one had been Reno’s doing as his publicist, but Jesus, of all the things he had done in his life, he realized that he had actually never babysitted before.

Kinan and his sister, Kinanti, or _Nancy_ as she liked to call herself these days, had always been looked over by a handful of trained nannies that might have actually been terribly overqualified for their job description when their mother had gone into one of her, as she called it, “work moods”, while she would go weeks without seeing them as she finished the designs her clients had commissioned. 

When they hadn’t been taken care of by the nannies, of course, his mother went on full caretaker mode, never actually leaving them alone, their free time filling with private lessons or play dates or whatever it was that amused them that day.

So, it wasn’t like Kinan had been left alone with small children. Family parties don’t really count. Though he entertained the playful of his little cousins at their family’s beach, their sitters had always been around, watching them like a hawk.

But when Giri said, “I need someone to take care of Kanggani while we were gone.” after Anta and him had decided to go on a small vacation by themselves at Kinan’s family’s Labuan Bajo’s villa, and Reno wasn’t meeting their gaze, he didn’t know why he held up one hand and said, “I can take care of her.”

Reno had sighed heavily, pushing his reading glasses up his nose. “I have work all weekend, Raka, I can’t help.”

“I have a little sister,” Kinan shrugged, “how bad could it be?”

From how Anta was sneering, he knew he just walked into a bear trap.

* * *

  
Kanggani wasn’t exactly a baby. She was a hundred of centuries old demon, in estimate, probably older than this world by itself, but it didn’t exactly matter. She acted like a twelve year old at normal occurrences. 

Shapeshifting had always been her favorite activity; every time Kinan had met her, she always had something slightly different, although the main idea was the same: she didn’t look out of place in Wardhana’s household. If anyone told him that she was Giri’s sister, he probably would’ve believed it. She also had a knack on using a pattern of appearances against all of them. With Giri, she was always younger by a few years from him. With Anta, she was rarely even a woman, preferring the form of a cat, always lounging on his lap while he worked. With Reno, she was an older woman.

With Kinan, he had no idea why, Kanggani always showed up as a child.

“Kinan,” she cooed, tugging at his pants as he was using household magic to tidy up the kitchen after trying to make cookies for her and Reno. Emphasis on _trying._ He didn’t know the result yes, as it was still in the oven, but he really wished it was at least edible. “I want ice cream. Can you buy me ice cream?”

“We’re waiting for the cookies,” he said as he typed _hope you’ll be here soon_ for Reno with a picture of the cookies in the oven.

Reno had said he had work all weekend, but he always said _that_ and went home early when Kinan was trying not to think about how lonely it would feel to sleep by himself. He would bring a present, or something else very sweet, and they would go into the nights, bathing in each other’s affection. It was some kind of intricate ritual that pleases Kinan. He wondered sometimes if Reno said it in purpose.

Kanggani simply pouted at him, tugging at his pants continuously until he decided to pick her up. She giggled. Her size was perfect for it, her physical age currently was probably six or seven year old. The kind of _child_ that could speak normally and would curse, and the cognitive dissonance sometimes fucked Kinan up.

“_You_ are waiting for the cookies, though, not me,” she said as she put her arms around Kinan’s neck, and Kinan had to keep reminding himself that she wasn’t actually a child. “I don’t understand why you would bother. It seems like you’ve never attempted it before, and you actually have money to buy some cookies that are actually _good_. Why try at all?”

He mulled it for a second. He could, of course, but he was always the type of person who did these kind of things. “It just feels more special,” he explained, “and it _means_ something more when you eat it, the fact that you made it.”

Kanggani responded with a thoughtful “Huh.” She was quiet for a second before she asked: “Can we still get ice cream later?”

“Fine,” Kinan said, because if he had a child, he would probably spoiled them rotten.

* * *

He bought Kanggani Häagen-Dasz, because the store had been closest to his house. It had nothing to do with the fact that his car was already heading to a minimarket and Kanggani simply looked at him, all watery eyes, and said, _you won’t just buy me Walls, don’t you_?

Kinan swerved.

He received Reno’s text a bit later, him saying _don’t let her bully you, I’ll be back soon_ and it had brought the brightest smile in his face. He knew him so well. If Kinan had been a more insecure person, being known by another person like the way Reno knew him would have left him shaking in his boots. But Reno was Reno, Reno who only looked at him, Reno who always go to him whenever he needs to, Reno who only needs him.

Perhaps, perhaps a small part of his brain had whispered, _that’s a little bit of ego-centric, isn’t it?_

Kanggani was halfway through the tub of caramel biscuit ice cream and already dipping into the banana chocolate brownie when she caught that smile and asked, “You two are really different than Anta and Giri.” She licked the spoon and dipped again, and Kinan almost scolded her, but decided not to. It wasn’t like she wasn’t going to finish both tubs by herself. He had no interest in joining her. That kind of ice cream put more work into his daily regiment.

“Different how?” He put down the phone near the kitchen counter and nibbled at one of the cookies that had turned out too brown. He had picked out the best looking ones and put it inside a jar, saving it for Reno. The ugly ones he ate by himself, with Kanggani’s help, and luckily it had been good enough. Things have certain way of turning out decently when it came to Kinan.

She waved the metal spoon around, making vague gestures. “You both trust each other, quite unconditionally,” she had shifted her body before she started to eat, looking like a twelve year old this time, with blond hair instead of her usual jet black. She looked like one of those cherubs in European churches paintings, but still with the tanned skin, glistening like she had put highlighter all over her skin. “Anta and Giri fight a lot about... honestly, everything. I don’t think Anta trust him after the whole Ramayana thing. He put him on a regular check up for drugs… not that Ramayana is traceable.”

Kinan had been on the front row of _the whole Ramayana thing_. He hadn’t even been apart of the fight, but still it had left him reeling with anxiety from the sheer intensity of it. “We don’t keep that kind of grave secrets from each other.”

Kanggani’s brow curled, and she gave him another thoughtful “Huh!” before saying, “Are you sure about that?”

“Why?”

“I’m sure Girindra have said this, but you do notice how dark his aura is, right?”

“Giri have pointed it out, but I hardly think it matters, since he’s always been nice to m—“

“Did he say to you that it’s pitch black?”

Kinan quietened at once. Giri had always told them how dark it was. Kinan had no understanding of aura, at all, but he would’ve guessed that it could be wrong. That it was not that bad, just altered by Giri’s perception about him. He never actually found—or did—anything bad about Reno, much to Kinan’s amusement, so he had dismissed that it was just Giri asserting his dominance thing that he used to did during high school. “I don’t think I’m quite following, Gani,” he said, settling into the nickname that Kanggani told him to use.

“Did you know that when Giri got possessed and I had to help him, he brought three bags of blood to me?”

“What do you need three bags of blood for?”

“_Exactly_!” She gave him a gleeful grin. “Normal people don’t know that _shit_.”

“Please stop cursing with that body. I’m so tempted to scold you for it right now.”

She raised her brows before turning her form into an older woman in the end of her 20s, the form that she loved to take when Reno was around. “All I’m saying is, that he knows a lot about demons for someone who works on, what, publishing?”

“Public relations. He’s a publicist, not a publisher,” Kinan nitpicked but he knew it didn’t matter.

“Anyway,” she dismissed it with a wave of her hand. “He shouldn’t know. Even Anta had only the barest of idea about demons when he first met me. Girindra is, well. He grew up with me, and he works at Lawang Sewu, so of course he’ll know. Reno, on the other hand, shouldn’t have that kind of knowledge, but he does.”

“Why are you telling me this? Are you trying to get me to break up with him?” Kinan frowned, biting into one of the burnt cookies, feeling it crumble inside his mouth. “Is this one of Giri’s tricks?”

She frowned at him. “No, I might be a demon but I’m not evil, you know,” she stabbed into the ice cream with the spoon. “I’m saying this because I like you two quite a lot, because Reno always bought me those chocolate cakes… anyway, do you have that cake right now? And I think you deserve to know the whole truth since _you_ bought me expensive ice cream."

Kinan frowned back at her. “I’m sure he has an explanation why he knows.”

Kanggani scooped a big dollop of the brownie ice cream and shoved it into her mouth. “So why not ask?” she said through a full mouth. Kinan wondered to himself if Giri or his father ever taught her to have manners.

“You’re really something else,” Kinan dipped the cookie into the ice cream, and Kanggani followed.

* * *

  
Reno’s last text was as followed: _be there at in 5._

Kanggani had turned into a cat after Kinan caught him eating cookies from the jar he had put aside for Reno, right when Kinan had left her for two minutes to get the food he ordered for dinner via Gojek. He hadn’t even had the time to open her mouth and warn her, when he walked in, she leapt from the table, the jar still opened.

He sighed. There were two or three missing from the pile. Kanggani licked her paw innocently, sitting in the edge of the couch. She looked humanely smug for a black cat.

“How much do you eat, really?” He asked, more astonished than anything else. He put the plastic bag on the table and started pulling out the food. It was a takeout from a seafood place, no rice, because Kinan had stopped eating rice when he could, although he cooked the rice anyway because Reno didn’t eat anything _but_ rice. He wasn’t sure if Reno even ate bread; every bread he had bought had ended up being eaten by him himself.

Kanggani barked at him. The sound rang throughout the living room.

A frown rose on his face. “You know that you’re a _cat_ right?”

“You know I’m a fucking _demon_ right?” the cat mouth moved to speak with the human voice, and the cognitive dissonance was so bad that Kinan lost whatever protest he was going to say.

* * *

Reno came home with the chocolate cake, hair messy from the wind, a cigarette hanging from between his lips. Kinan pursed his lips when he saw him—but said nothing as he just took it off Reno’s mouth and put it off against a ceramic ashtray. His lover looked tired, disheveled at the edges, but had smiled when he pulled him into a kiss.

“Ugh, you taste like cigarettes,” Kinan said as he pulled away.

“And you taste sweet, Raka,” he sniffed at the air, “actually, the entire kitchen smells really sweet.” He slid the paper box to Kanggani’s direction with a thin smile. “Your favorite.”

With great enthusiasm, Kanggani opened the box and started eating. Kinan tried not to point out how much sweets she had consumed in one day. Instead, he wrapped his arms around Reno’s face and took a long stare at his face, documenting a little dry skin around his left cheek, the stubble growing from his jaw, his dark eyes staring back. Reno’s hand slid to his spine and settled there, a warm presence, grounding him.

“Please use some moisturizer for that,” he said, and Reno simply chuckled.

“I trust that you haven’t been bullied too bad by her?” 

“Bold of you to assume I’ve been bullied,” Kinan answered, but Kanggani’s instant snort collapsed his defense. “We baked some cookies for you—well, I did. There’s not a lot though, Gani ate a bit of it.”

“I’m sure you still have enough for me,” Reno said as he gently pried Kinan’s hands away. “I’m going to shower, okay?” He left Kinan a quick kiss before walking away. He left a smell of his magic behind him—something that had become so familiar to Kinan, mingling with his own scent—a smell so strong that Kinan left wondering what he had done.

Kanggani was halfway through the cake when she smiled at him; all-knowing, and at once he knew that she had been full of the same observation. She was no longer blond, back to her usual form, although she remained as a young woman. Kinan was left with the feeling that he was missing something from the equation, something that he did not quite understand.

“His aura really doesn’t transfer to you, doesn’t he?” Kanggani remarked.

“Is that even how it works?” Kinan asked back, though he wasn’t in the business of wanting to know.

“If it’s that black, it just eventually happens whether you like it or not,” she mused. She took another bite of the chocolate cake, the cream staining the bow of her lips. “Aura like that—it stains to people around him, making them darker. But you’re not affected. It’s like he _knows_ exactly what he’s doing,” with her thumb, she swiped the cream off, “and is protecting you.”

“Doesn’t that mean he’s good?”

“It means that he loves you.”

Kinan frowns. Isn’t that enough? He wondered, silently, if it was enough for love to be enough for these people—it simply was enough for _him_, to be loved like that by Reno. “Doesn’t it work the other way around?”

Kanggani smiles, fondly. “I wish it is that naive, but who knows?"


	2. Chapter 2

Kinan was not the type to ask. He had Kanggani on his lap while the television was marathoning Friends—a guilty pleasure he was quite sure Giri would never let rest if he’d find out, not that it actually mattered, since he’d known for a long time how much of a sucker Kinan was for romantic comedies—when Reno sidled up against him, his hair still wet from the shower, and a floral scent of the moisturizer coming out of his face, but. There was something else underneath, something that still seared hot even under the smell of soap.

Reno’s magic smelled like his cologne and pine and jasmine, something so completely mystical that would’ve fit Giri and his little cousin with the short hair rather than someone who rarely even used household magic. It bothered Kinan, suddenly, how much he reeked, because a simple spell wouldn’t leave the kind of smell that lingered even with showers.

So, Kinan wasn’t usually the type to ask, and yet. And yet the curiosity crawled under his skin.

Reno raised a brow at him, looking through the guarded expression he had and Kinan was struck with the feeling that he knew. He knew about how dying Kinan was to ask, because he knew everything else, guessed it so gentlemanly, fussing over every of Kinan’s need like he owned a backdoor to Kinan’s brain. He knew how much Kinan was holding back, but he didn’t say anything, because he didn’t want to answer.

I just know things, he remembered Reno saying.

They were both waiting for the other to talk. The tension hung heavy around them. Kanggani, on the other hand, only watched quietly, anticipating. Probably enjoying how much pressure she could see between them.

The thing was, Kinan was sure that this would end up with a fight. A fight that would leave him all alone in the depths of night, the smell of smoke wafting from under the door as Reno sleeps in the couch, not even bothering to serve him anything but silence. Kinan hated their fights, easy as it was, with them compromising, them always finding a middle ground. No one left sulking for a month—like Giri and Anta do a lot—and no one got hurt, but still.

Kinan hated sleeping without Reno’s presence.

They were both busy people. Reno being his publicist aside, he had his own work on the side, though often Reno would go with him to his work trips, or sometimes the other way around, when he’d stay at a five star hotel that would guarantee confidentiality. A complete night with each other was rare.

Kinan leaned his head on Reno’s shoulder and didn’t say anything. 

* * *

Reno was asleep beside him when Kanggani opened the door, very quietly. Kinan, who wasn’t asleep but whose feet were tangled beneath Reno’s, moved his head and looked up. The digital clock beside him was on 6:04. 

He was hit by the realization that this view was familiar; he felt like looking at himself as a child, barely old enough to be by himself in such a big house, coming down from a nightmare by knocking at his parents’ door. Except that it was highly unlikely for Kanggani to have nightmares—he was pretty sure that she had not even the need to sleep—so she was probably just _bored_. He wondered quietly if this what it felt like to have a kid.

Reno would be annoyed to have been roused before he was ready to wake up. If there was one thing that Kinan was annoyed to find out about Reno, it was that he wasn’t a morning person. Quite an understatement of the century. He wasn’t even a _noon_ person; he was _wake me up before noon and I’ll fucking have a bad mood for the entire day_ person. Every time he had to wake up before 11, Reno spent an hour grumpily lounging on the couch with his RayBan in front of his eyes, scowling fiercely the entire time. It didn’t matter when he fall asleep; he never had _enough_.

Having a kid with Reno was a thought he had not considered before but he was surprised to find out not to mind.

Kinan, on the other hand, was an _early_ morning person. Kanggani knew that. The last time he crashed on Giri’s house, she amused him by accompanying him on his early exercises, things he’d done twice-over before the sun even came out. 

_Giri never does this_, she said that time.

Kinan had looked over as Giri walked out with a cigarette between his lips and his alcohol tummy out, and said, grins on their faces, _obviously_.

“What do you want?” he asked.

She tilted her head, smiled, and answered: “Don’t you want a company while you exercise?”

And he was ready to snipe back, saying, _what if I don’t_? Except that no kidding, he wanted to exercise after the excessive amount of sugar intake he had consumed so gracefully yesterday, and yes, he did _want_ a company, because while lifting his own weight certainly did not turn any easier with somebody’s around, but somebody around that wasn’t Reno glaring at him from behind his sunglasses was a nice thought.

At the end, Kinan answered, “Yes. Alright. Give me three minutes.”

* * *

He was on his 100th push up when Kanggani, who was sitting near his hand, said with a quiet voice, “You smelled it.”

It wasn’t a question but it might as well be, though the certainty still hung heavy between them, heavy as the air that hung around Reno. He switched into his other hand and talked between the counts, “I don’t think anyone with a working sense of smell could miss that kind of scent.” His throat was parched and his muscles were starting to ache, but he continued through it as Kanggani, very noisily, slurped her iced lemonade.

Reno wouldn’t be awake for at least another six hours, something of a slight relief to him, who couldn’t maintain the volume of his voice while he was trying to maintain the balance and the flexing of his muscles. Kanggani pursed his lips at him around the stainless steel straw, pearly white digits dragging through the steel: “So why did you not ask why he smelled that way?”

He wanted to snipe back, but decided not to. “I didn’t want to.” 

“Yes, but why? You were perfectly keen on asking before.”

“I’m not that possessive,” he’s starting to lose control of his breath, earning him the kind of breathlessness that would normally annoy him, “I don’t have to know all the time what Reno does.”

“But it’s a _big_ complicated magic, that smell.”

“Yes,” he breathed in wrong.

“And considering that he’s a publicist, it’s really rare for someone like that to need to perform magic that powerful.”

“Maybe.”

“But you decided not to ask.”

His hand slipped and it was by his old basketball reflex alone that he was prevented from planting his face to the floor. “_Jesus H. Christ_.” He flipped his body so he was facing the sky, the early morning blue, cloudless, enveloping his sight with its familiarity. “Yes, I wanted to ask, but I didn’t want us to _fight_, alright? Please let me exercise peacefully, Gani, or I swear to God—“

“You can ask him right now.”

“He won’t be awake for at least another six hours.”

“I mean, you _can_.”

He lifted his head and almost let out a string of curses. Reno was staring at him, expression neutral as always, leaning on the door way with the white satin he was wearing two buttons undone, revealing his pale, slightly hairy chest. He didn’t say anything, just continued to stare, again, in the way of _daring_ Kinan to say something. 

“Reno,” Kinan sat up, suddenly losing ability to string up words into coherent sentence. Which was pointless, because, if anything, Reno probably already knew what was happening already. “We were talking about you,” he added honestly. Because if anything, that was their entire relationship: honest, even if it wasn’t completely.

“Obviously,” Kanggani added.

Reno tilted his head in a way that should have meant _obviously_.

Kinan wiped the sweat off his brow and decided to strengthen his heart. “You reeked of magic yesterday,” he started, “_powerful_ magic. We were wondering what it was.”

And Kinan was in perfect knowledge that Reno _could_ definitely lie. He didn’t think he would have been able to tell the difference if he did. He certainly had not noticed if he had lied or not the entire time they were together. The thing was, Kinan also _trusted_ him not to, which did not meant anything if he already did; but he was happy to tell himself that he would know if he did.

Reno’s brow furrowed for a second, thinking, and Kinan was hit by the sudden realization by he would have already known what to answer. He should have asked last night.

“I was redoing my house’s barrier magic,” the answer was practiced, and Kinan could see the _lie_ screaming at him. “Ummi couldn’t do it and my sister is pretty incompetent and unavailable, so she asked me to.”

It was the kind of lie that _made_ a whole damn sense, but still, there was a gnawing sense of disbelief in the pit of Kinan’s stomach that shrieked that he should not take it at face value. Reno’s childhood home was in an expensive neighbourhood, the kind that needed strong barrier magic so they wouldn’t get robbed, and as Kinan understood it, his father was rarely at home and his sister was… always off doing other things, if the gossip was true. So it _made_ sense. And yet, Kinan found himself not believing it.

But, he didn’t want a fight, so he only said, “Oh.”

“Does it matter?” Reno asked back, calm as ever.

Kinan felt the anger pooling under his muscles, could understand, for a flash, why Giri and Anta fight roughly, unable to find a compromise. 

“No,” he lied, but it didn’t matter, ‘cause Reno lied too.

* * *

Reno left for work and he was surprised to find his phone ringing. Giri’s contact name was accompanied by a fire emoticon and a picture of him on the bridge near Kinan’s house, the setting sun hiding most of his expression. Kinan stared at the contact name and frowned, contemplated whether or not to pick up, before ultimately deciding to.

“Yes,” he said, instead of a _hello_, because his mood was dark and there was nothing to change it.

“You sound so down, crown prince,” Giri said, in his trademark mocking tone. 

“I’m pissed right now.”

“What did Reno do?”

If it were a normal Kinan he would defend Reno, got offended by how quick Giri had concluded that it was something that Reno had done instead of someone (or something) else. “He lied,” he said, after a pregnant pause, “but I can’t prove that he’s lying because while his lie makes _sense_, it doesn’t mean that I trust him.”

There was silence in the reply, a rustling, another voice saying “_What, he’s serious_?” before Kinan promptly realized that he was on loudspeaker. “God, it must snow in Bali tomorrow if you somehow wake up in the wrong bed this morning and noticed that there’s something fishy going on with your boyfriend.”

“Giri, give it a rest,” the other voice, who must be Antariksa’s, said, but with a chuckle at the end. 

“It’s your fault for saying all the things you have said about his aura being dark and all,” Kinan rubbed the side of his face and sat down on the couch, “it’s rubbing off on Kanggani, she’s been saying the same things and about him giving her blood when she needed it—“

“He gave her _blood_?’

“Wait, you didn’t know?” 

“When was this?”

“Remember when you got stuck in Lawang Sewu for a month?”

“That was _him_?”

“Oh,” he said, as Kanggani appeared at the other end of the table in front of a couch with a scowl. “Oh. She didn’t tell you. I thought she did, you have been so civil towards Reno these last couple of months.”

“I’ve just been,” Giri stopped for a second, like he was thinking, “my resentment towards him stands. It’s just that I’ve been busy thinking of other things and he hasn’t been doing anything shady for a while.”

“You’re just too suspicious on him that everything he does is shady to your eyes,” Antariksa interjected wisely. “What did he lie about?” 

“He smelled so much like magic last night, and since Gani had been saying some things, I got… got _curious_ about what it was, since it wasn’t normal for him to do magic. So I asked. He said he was redoing the barrier magic in his house since his mother asked.”

“That makes sense. He lives in Dharmawangsa area, right? There’s been a string of thievery there,” Antariksa replied. 

“I know it makes sense. I don’t know if I believe him.”

Giri whistled, singsong. “That’s rare.”

Kinan closed his eyes, felt the sun’s kiss on his eyelids, and agreed, though hesitantly: “Yeah. Completely new to me.” 

* * *

Kanggani was waiting on him when he finished the call, his mood raising a little although not completely. He said it, sometimes, but he didn’t say it enough, how much he appreciated Antariksa and Giri’s company. He didn’t ask how Giri knew when to call—God knows he wasn’t the person who call often—but he was nothing but grateful.

“I’m sorry,” she said, with a pout. 

Kinan stared at her, confused at the sudden apology. He scratched his head and said, “It’s okay. It’s not like it’s something that I don’t already know.”

She stared at him, eyes like a cat, warm yellow, and Kinan was hoping she would just disappear like normal, or at least request him a tub of ice cream. He wondered, quietly, if she had planned this—like Reno always do—her saying all these things when they were alone together, but he concluded that maybe he was being a tad too paranoid.

“So is it enough?” she asked, and Kinan knew, what she was asking, but asked back anyway.

“What is?”

“Just being loved.”

And Kinan wished he was him before this weekend, him that closed his eyes, all the time, at all the oddities and darkness that came from being with Moreno Makarim, but did he not care because they love each other, or was he just in denial the entire time, he didn’t know. The important thing was, the questions were a part of him now, and there was nothing he could do but hearing Reno’s truth that could change that.

“He loves me,” he stated, but it wasn’t the answer, not really. “It really should be enough.”

He wasn’t the only one lying on this house, so _who cares_.


End file.
